What Sarah Saw
by AIs4Awsome
Summary: in an isolated Englsh village, Sarah life is turned upside down on her seventeenth birthday after she receives a cat from her grandmother. A strange boy who claims to be the Bogeyman begins visiting her at night. As Sarah falls deeper into madness she struggles to decide what is real and what is not.
1. Preface

_"I remember my own childhood vividly...I knew terrible things. But I knew I musn't let adults know I knew. It would scare them." _-Maurice Sendak

Preface

It was only a duck pond at the back of the farmhouse. It wasn't very big.

Gram said it was an ocean, but I thought that was silly. Gram was bag-of-bats crazy and what did she know, anyway? After all, she believed a pack of blood-thirsty wolves lived in the wall behind her bed. She said she could hear them at night, clawing and scratching and scuffling, eager to devour her.

My mother said Gram's mind was broken, that her morning pills had meddled with her mind to the point she couldn't remember properly. Gram said my mother was wrong. She remembered the ocean beyond the farmhouse. She remembered a dry moon, the smell of horse sweat and wood smoke, heather and gorse. She remembered eyes that glinted like chinks of gold in the darkness.

Above all, Gram remembered the Bogeyman.

**A****/N: I know it's a bit short but it's just a taste of what is to come. This is going to be part dark fairy tale, part drama and part coming of age story. I'm not really expecting a lot of followers/reviews because it is a strange concept. I'm putting a few of my other more ambitious projects on hold to get through this one so hopefully I'll be able to update fairly often :)**


	2. One

Nobody came to my seventeenth birthday party.

There was a birthday cake in the center of the dining room table with seventeen candles, surrounded by ten empty chairs, borrowed from Nancy Duncannon for the day. The cake had a grinning bumble bee drawn on it and below the bubble bee the words "Happy Bee-Day" were written in lemon icing. My mother, who had organized the party, told me that the lady at the bakery had said all the best birthday cakes were already taken.

When it became clear that nobody was going to show up, I blew out my candles and ate a slice of cake, as did my brother, Sonny, and his friend. They weren't there as participants though, only observers. They took their cake and ran out to the barn, laughing, while Gram sat by the fire, spitting tobacco and shaking her grizzled head at them.

I unwrapped my presents alone. From Mum there was a scratchy looking dress and a boxed set of the Bronte's work which I grudgingly took to my room. Mum was always trying to get me to read important sounding books with strange, complicated words in them. Worse, I'd never been a fan of the Bronte Bunch. After I opened the books, Gram came into my room and handed me a cardboard box. She didn't stick around to watch me open it, pleading a migraine. The box was surprisingly heavy and I placed it on the floor. The box moved. Cautiously, I lifted the lid.. A black face stared up at me, filled with hate. The cat clearly wasn't used to being in a box. He was a huge three-legged tom and had a flat, squished face that would've looked almost comical if he wasn't missing an eye. I lifted a hand to touch him but he pulled back, hissing, and swiped at my offending hand with a twisted paw. He leapt from the box and stalked off to the far corner by the window where he glared at me with a single green eye. I glared back. When I had told Gram three months ago that I wanted a cat, I had meant a soft, cuddly little thing. Not_ this_.

It felt like a bad joke.

Leaving the tom in my room, I headed downstairs and into the kitchen where Gram sat in her padded chair nursing a flask of tea and muttering vague nonsense under her breathe. Seeing me, her dry, bloodless lips pulled back into a grin.

"So, what d'you think, luvvy? Just what you wanted, eh?"

I opened my mouth but no words came out. Gram looked pleased with herself.

"Found 'im this mornin' in the Delaney's ditch." she continued "Thought he could use some lovin'."

"He's great, Gram." I lied, too much of a coward to admit that her strange gift repulsed me.

"Pity no one came to the party." Gram said. She paused and sucked loudly at her tea-stained teeth. "Reckon they forgot?"

"Perhaps." Another lie. Nobody forgot because I hadn't invited anyone in the first place. The kids who were in my classes at school weren't my friends They were simply people I went to school with.

This didn't bother me nearly as much as it should have. I liked being alone.

"Ah well. Always next year, eh, Hammish?" she said, nudging at the fat Highland Terrier at her feet. Hammish didn't respond. Of course he didn't. He was a dog after all, and not a very bright one, either.


End file.
